Match Game 7x - did it naturally run its course?

[Ian Wallis]

Match Game 7x was the No. 1 rated game show for a couple of years in the mid-70s before Family Feud took over that spot.  It was seen in late afternoon on CBS except for a brief period in the fall of 1977 where it was moved to the mornings.  When ratings dropped, it was abruptly moved back to afternoons.  Gene has been quoted as saying he thinks the move to the mornings was its biggest downfall, saying that they "never recovered" - despite the quick move back to afternoon.

It stayed on the network until March 1979, then was cancelled, in part to make way for the group favorite Whew!  It came back for three more years in syndication that fall, for a nine year total run.

When I watch the show, I notice a big difference between shows from 74 or 75, compared to 78.  Many of the 78 shows just seem kind of stale - they're not as funny as the ones that came before.  Most of the 74 and 75 shows are really enjoyable.

Do you think if the show had never moved to mornings that it could have lasted longer on the network, or do you think it just naturally ran its course?  Nine years is a long run - I'm not sure how much longer Gene hoped it would run.

I think shows of that type have a bit of a shelf life before they don't quick work anymore.

Thoughts?

[chrisholland03]

In my opinion, the answer is yes and no.

I agree with Rayburn, the move to mornings was the ultimate downfall of the daytime show.  The staleness in the later episodes, in my opinion, is more of a function of: 1) booking too many celebrity hams and turkeys; 2) the heavy editing to keep to time as a result of the hams and turkeys



   

[aaron sica]

I think the expansion of soaps to an hour (on CBS) would have eventually killed it anyway.

That 3:30 slot mainly belonged to game shows and sitcom reruns. CBS kept it longer than its competitors did. Let's say that CBS kept MG on at 3:30 up until Y&R expanded to an hour. Just as "One Day at a Time" moved to 4pm from its 3:30 slot to accomodate the Y&R expansion, the same thing would have happened to MG in 1980 with what happened to it in '77. The move to the 4pm timeslot didn't help, it only hurt.

[Neumms]

Losing Dawson was a problem they never solved. If the show had remained highly rated at 2:30 Central, it may have been a more attractive gig and they'd have had better options. Such as it was, they never found the right guy who was good at the game and had the kind of skeezy 70s hunkiness.

Another problem: Brett become a less bubbly, more tired alcohol enthusiast. Rayburn, too.

Watching the MG/HSH, though, I think the Match Game half rebounded despite Bowzer in such a prominent seat. I'm loyal  to Charles and wouldn't have ditched Brett entirely, but some of the new panelists gave it energy. So I don't think it ran its course, it just needed a kick in the pants.

Even in the morning, MG alone would have improved on much of what NBC was running at the time.

[TimK2003]

Here is my Love/Hate for the later years of MG:

Why I loved the later years?  Because of the introduction of the Star Wheel and the occasional double value of the head to head match -- it gave all 6 celebs a shot to play for the big money instead of just Dawson 90% of the time.  Plus Richard's antics were getting predictable and stale by the time he started being the grump he was in his waning months.

Why I hated the later years?  As someone already mentioned, the heavy editing:  I can forgive old man Goodson for letting it happen on the syndicated MGPM and on the nightly 5-a-week syndie versions so it would either fit a full game within 30 minutes, or it always would end with the Star Wheel on Friday's show, accordingly and all the contestants were able to play 2 games each.

But doing the heavy editing on the CBS episodes?  Why?  Goodson loved to pad some of his shows in order to stretch his prize budget (Body Language, Password Plus, Super Password, Eubanks Card Sharks, to name a few).  Many times I was still trying to think of an answer to fill a BLANK, and 3 seconds later everybody had their answers written and Gene was asking for the contestant's response.

I never thought that there was too much "dead air" in the early days of MG'7x during the think cues.  If there was, Gene always seemed to fine a way to make something happen. 

[Neumms]

Why I hated the later years?  As someone already mentioned, the heavy editing...

Maybe there were times they edited too much, but waiting for Charles was growing as tiresome at home as it was to Brett. The 21st Century version should cut out way more deliberation time.

[Neumms]

But doing the heavy editing on the CBS episodes?  Why?  Goodson loved to pad some of his shows in order to stretch his prize budget (Body Language, Password Plus, Super Password, Eubanks Card Sharks, to name a few).

How were they padding? None were Split Second, but they were by no means slow. If they wanted to stretch the prize budget, they could have cut the prize money or added rounds before the endgames.

[TimK2003]

But doing the heavy editing on the CBS episodes?  Why?  Goodson loved to pad some of his shows in order to stretch his prize budget (Body Language, Password Plus, Super Password, Eubanks Card Sharks, to name a few).

How were they padding? None were Split Second, but they were by no means slow. If they wanted to stretch the prize budget, they could have cut the prize money or added rounds before the endgames.

Body Language had a significant amount of pre-game banter with contestants and celebs in order to assure the game would last the whole 30 minutes.

Super Password did the same to try to keep one full match per day.  Didn't always happen that way, but it always felt that if the day started with a Ca$hword segment, it usually ended the show one puzzle before or after a Ca$hword segment, if not right at one.

I think Eubanks Card Sharks added the 10 Audience Member Surveys as a way to throttle the match and to avoid having more than one Money Cards round per day.  Back in the Perry days, it wasn't out of the norm sometimes to see 3 trips to the Money Cards within one episode.

Meanwhile, here is MG'79 potentially giving away twice as much money via the Star Wheel format while cutting 75% of the think music time, which in effect was offering up more than double the daily prize budget they had during MG'75 because the rounds went quicker.

/I'm not counting the early MG'73 episodes, as those questions were more straightforward and did not need as much thought.  Hence why there were usually two Super Match segments per episode.

[TLEberle]

I wouldn’t say that three Money Cards was ever the norm.

[Argo]

IMHO, it definitely did run it's course naturally.

As others have mentioned you could feel Gene and the regulars getting bored or just tired. Gene had done the show since 1962, albeit a different format, but still. Brett and CNR seemed to be trying to find ways to play fight. Dawson's departure didn't hurt as much as his attitude months before he did leave. Bill Daly and McClean Stevenson were the best semi-regulars after Dawson IMHO of course. The biggest indication for me and reason why I don't like episodes after 78 is the constant editing. Having to edit to time was one thing, but it just seemed to send the message to viewers, rightly or wrongly, that nothing interesting was going on. If they had dubbed the music in post and stopped using the annoying canned laughter, at least it wouldn't have been as obvious.

During the original broadcasts no doubt the time change affected the audience and I guess the ratings didn't help the performers to perform at their best, but even when I see reruns today I just don't find 78 onward enjoyable to watch. The episodes where McLean Stevenson hosted and the "Cuckoo Friend and Ollie" episode were the only ones that stand out for me.

And as much as the updated versions of the classic games are good for today's audience, I just don't find the "in your face" and fake style of television entertaining to watch. Everything is "too polished" now. Some of the funniest moments on MG I enjoyed were when Gene would go off stage and tease the crew or jump off into the audience. I'm sorry, but unless something drastic happens,  things like that are never going to happen again, unless they're just shown on YouTube as a behind the scenes or some "Entertainment Tonight" exclusive. Nobody can seem to be satisfied with "live to tape" and just shoot what happens anymore.

[calliaume]

The question content, which seemed so racy in 1974, had become old hat by 1978. (As Anne Beatts of the original Saturday Night Live said of that show, you can only be avant-garde for so long before you become garde.) The silliness between the stars and the content covered a really weak format.

The odd thing I've seen is many histories claim every question was salacious (one claimed every answer was either "boobs" or "tinkle"). There was usually one racy question per show on the CBS version; the daily syndicated version cut back on that, and there were rarely any racy questions on MG-HS.

As noted, Dawson's departure, the time shifts (4 PM was a terrible time slot because different parts of the country saw the show at different times), and general boredom contributed to the show's cancellation. And while 5-3/4 years doesn't seem like that long a run in the context of today's daytime warhorses, it's actually the fourth-longest game show run in CBS's history (behind The Price Is Right, Let's Make a Deal, and Password).

[BrandonFG]

I think it's a little of everything mentioned above. Like Curt said, by 1978 TV wasn't as risque as it was a few years prior. It was still things you couldn't say that you can now, but "boobs" or "tinkle" was not as big of a deal.

To me, it's similar to some of Norman Lear's sitcoms. Shows like All in the Family and Good Times were groundbreaking and controversial in 1974. By the end of the decade, they were regular sitcoms with generic plot lines. The social commentary had subsided by that point.

Add to that the panel's chemistry wasn't as strong, and you have a show that became long in the tooth. Bill Daily and McLean Stevenson were suitable replacements for Richard, but it just wasn't the same.

[chris319]

Goodson loved to pad some of his shows in order to stretch his prize budget

No he didn't. The prize money was inconsequential. FWIW, the winnings on P+ were remarkably level at $22,000 per "week" (group of five shows).

When MG left CBS they started editing the think time. Ira would be on stage and time the think time for every question on his Seiko wristwatch which had a stopwatch function. They then adjusted the show's running time so it wouldn't come up short when the writing time was edited. This was done to pick up the pace of the show.

In 1980 Ira got a call from Jerry Chester. Jerry said he didn't think he could sell another year of syndicated MG as is, and what could be done about it? Some ideas were tossed around but nothing stuck.

Goodson had written a memo predicting the demise of MG. He didn't like a show he had seen somewhere. Maybe it was too "zany" for him. Who knows? He singled out Rayburn. I know I got tired of seeing Brett when she was totally wasted.

I don't know why they persisted in booking McLean Stevenson. He was usually in seat 5 and would milk his time on camera, running off at the mouth and not being funny. Arte Johnson and Richard Paul were much better in that seat. Gary Burghoff also added a lot.

On 1970's MG the civilian contestants were pretty staid and reserved. On the Fremantle version, the civilian contestants are just awful. They have "unemployed actor/waiter desperate for attention" written all over them. The are unnaturally "up" and it cmes across as way too forced. It's hard to like contestants like that. The problem is, their "up" attitude competes with the panel. The whole thing is just too giddy, like an overdose of sugar.

[Eric Paddon]

McLean Stevenson was simply not that funny IMO.    I really found it odd how he would try to basically assume the old Richard role of mocking contestants bad answers by referring to the "dumb-off" but the problem is that he wasn't that great a game player himself.     Dawson could do it because he was always razor-sharp with the perfect answer in a round so if he knocked a bad answer, it was funny because he had underlying credibility.

It was also evident how they were trying to be cheap on the budget by (1) not giving a contestant $100 for winning a game and (2) there are a LOT of strike-outs at the audience match because they started getting tougher and more esoteric so there is a much higher percentage of games where there's no head-to-head match as opposed to the CBS years.

[jjman920]

Goodson loved to pad some of his shows in order to stretch his prize budget

No he didn't. The prize money was inconsequential. FWIW, the winnings on P+ were remarkably level at $22,000 per "week" (group of five shows).

Super Password could've fooled me. Compared to P+, the show felt like watching peanut butter pour out of the jar.